St. Charles North’s Preusse glad he gave water polo 2nd chance

There’s a longstanding joke that one of my friends from my old newspaper days in Elmhurst used to tell about this time of year.

He’d say, “water polo is a great sport but it can be murder on the horses.”

Of course, water polo is a little different sport from polo. There are no horses involved and it isn’t played on land — hence the term water polo.

But it can be pretty tough on the participants — just ask St. Charles North’s Andrew Preusse.

As a freshman, Preusse remembers one of his first days of high school water polo practice for all the wrong reasons.

“I got decked in the face,” Preusse recalled. “One of the upperclassmen hit me in the face as he followed through on a shot and busted my nose wide-open.

“At that point, I decided I wasn’t ready to play yet.”

The next spring, Preusse put aside his fears and returned to the pool.

“I gave it another shot, and I’m glad I did because I love it,” said Preusse.

Two years later, Preusse is one of the leading varsity returnees for the North Stars, who are trying to improve upon last season’s 17-13 finish.

Last weekend, St. Charles North posted a 3-1 record and third-place finish at the season-opening Stagg Invitational.

On the surface, winning three of four matches while averaging nearly 16 goals per game seems like pretty heady stuff for a team that struggled to a 5-23 finish just two years ago.

Think again.

“We really wanted to win that tournament,” said Preusse, who scored a team-high 16 goals in four games as the North Stars topped the 20-goal plateau in wins over St. Rita (20-7) and Riverside-Brookfield (22-5).

The lone blemish came during a 15-7 loss to 20th-ranked Stagg, which went on to capture the tourney title.

“We were down by one (goal) going into the second quarter but then we got outscored 7-0 in the second quarter,” said Preusse. “We let our guard down and had one bad quarter.”

Coach Chris Cloy’s North Stars finished the tourney on a positive note, though, with their 14-10 third-place victory over Hinsdale Central, a team that had defeated them last season.

Senior captain Justin Jacobson and junior Joey Chokran joined Preusse as double-digit goal scorers last weekend.

“We should be a high-scoring team this year,” said Preusse, who combined with Mike Nield and Jacobson to score the majority of the North Stars’ goals a year ago.

Bryan Passini, Kyle Passini, Josh Kerr and Nick Lutsch also provide senior leadership for the North Stars, who compete at the Hinsdale Central Invitational this weekend and visit cross-town rival St. Charles East March 24.

St. Charles North is fresh off of its fifth-place finish at last month’s state swimming meet, where Preusse took ninth in the 50-yard freestyle and was a member of three top-eight relay teams.

“We have a lot of experienced swimmers on the team,” said Preusse, who plays at the driver position. “And we’ve got some really fast swimmers.”

Water polo is a combination of swimming, hockey, soccer, team handball and even a little basketball.

“It can be a dirty game,” said Preusse. “It’s a tough sport. I’ve gotten hit going for loose balls, and some guys are really good at getting away with things. It’s kind of like the NBA where players try to sell fouls.”

Incidentally, basketball was Preusse’s first love growing up in Ohio.

“My sport was basketball,” said the 6-foot-4 Preusse, who uses his height and long arms to his advantage in water polo. “I played AAU basketball in Ohio.”

Swimming has since taken over a big part of Preusse’s life since his arrival at St. Charles North, where he admittedly has learned a great deal about himself, both in and out of the pool.

“I love Coach (Rob) Rooney,” Preusse said of the North Stars’ veteran swim coach. “He has been a great influence on my life and always will be.”

For now, Preusse’s passion is water polo.

“Playing water polo is kind of like a gift to swimmers after their season has finished,” he said. “You’re able to reap a lot of benefits from the countless hours you have spent in the pool.”

Last summer, Preusse and Jacobson picked up some valuable pointers from attending a weeklong water polo camp in California.

“I really didn’t know the game very well so it was very helpful,” said Preusse. “Everybody talks about California being known for having great water polo players and we experienced it for ourselves.

“It was an enlightening experience in all aspects of the game. I learned some things about technique and the importance of moving without the ball.”

Ranked just outside the preseason top 20 by illpolo.com (Illinois’ high school water polo website), St. Charles North could be a team to reckon with before season’s end.

“A lot of people doubted us during swimming season and we finished in the top five,” said Preusse. “Now we’ve got to show everyone again in water polo.”